Progress ~ On all fronts :)

Sorry I haven’t shared with you all yet this month!  But progress has been happening here!!!

First let me share my hand quilting progress… for this sharing I will be linking to Kathy’s Slow Sunday Stitching HERE …

Above is my progress a week ago…

And below is what I am working on this week…

I am about half done or a bit more presently with this area 🙂   On the quilting for this quilt I am over 30% now !!!!   Progress!!!!

And did you notice the little pink and white cameo of a hand crank machine attached to my quilt??

It is a NEEDLE KEEPER!!!!  Given to me by my friend Debbie!  I LOVE it too!

The cameo has a strong magnet on the backside and then you take the second magnet and put under your quilt… the magnets are VERY strong too and work well to hold my needles while quilting 🙂

I haven’t made any new progress on my Log Cabin quilt I pieced into blocks last month… but that will soon meet my cross hairs and get webbed together 🙂

I am trying to figure out my inner border… so that stalled me a bit then a need came along that took all my attention…

Oven mitts…

See how small the center ones are compared to the 2 new ones I completed this past week!

I altered the original pattern I found from Crafty Gemini on Youtube… and made it BIGGER!

I think it turned out well the second time around… it made up easier and washes well and works wonderfully well… so with this fabric I decided to make some very good friends who just bought a new and maybe their final home … so a house warming gift was in order!!!!

Here is my pattern made out of plain cardstock I use in the computer printer…

and here is their first oven mitt…

It was great fun making them and I really got to test out my 401a… these Singer sewing machines from the 1950’s that were all metal just rock!!!!

Well Robin had recently mentioned she would like me to make her a quilt for her KING SIZE bed!  Oh my… no time yet for that… so whilst sewing the mitts I planned a cute loving pillow for Robin… she is still healing from open heart surgery and having some complications in her healing…

I did a bit of hand embroidery after I machine quilted both the front and back panel of the pillow… Her fave colors she said are green, red and white… and I think this pretty fabric fits the bill perfectly… Yippeee!!!!

Soon I had them all ready to wash and  mail off to them at their NEW address 🙂  ..

I am excited as they should receive them in Monday’s mail!!!!

So that is why I haven’t had time to catch you all up… hope you understand… I have been busy! lol

I also bought a little flag for our front door this week…

 And here is a perspective view of our front porch at Casa Del Loro ….

Also… I was excited to find out…. I won a bloggers linky party loot!!!!

 Here is a close up of the fabrics…

And HERE is a link to her LOVELY blog!

The fabrics are a fat eighth bundle… she got a fat quarter bundle and divided it to share with one lucky linker… I was it!!!!

You see I love doing giveaways… but I never WIN!!! lol  So I was giddy to win this and coming to me from the UK!!!!  I love long distance fabrics in my stash the most for sure!!!

So what is next??!!

I will be piecing a BOM by Wendy at Wehago Designs >>>> HERE!

You can surely join in if you are interested… we are in our 4th month of 9 patch variations BOM.. each month is a surprise provided by Wendy with all the cutting and piecing specifics to make a 12″ finished block!!!!

She provides hand piecing and machine piecing tidbits too!  Awesome 🙂

I have more to share but I suspect this is enough for this post… I will not be away so long… continue to send up happy thoughts for my right hand to heal from some broken fingernails… so I can pick up the pace this coming week on my hand quilting progress!!!

Have a blessed Sunday and remember .. no matter what this is ALWAYS true if we look for it!….

As a P. S. I would like to wish my daddy a happy birthday today!

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Feeling LOVEly Here!!!

Yesterday was Valentine’s Day around the world… I am sorry I didn’t have more time to be able to chat with you all… but you are important to me ❤

If you are friends with me on Facebook you saw this Valentine Sentiment I shared with my followers…

But here I like to share the WHOLE story and not just snippets…

It has been over a week since I have chatted with you all here… let me catch you up!

I have been doing some slow stitching 

this week as I worked on the binding of the Tennessee Fall wall hanging…

I have been calling this my Fall Wall Hanging… but when it was time to make the label I thought this quilt would surely deserve something a bit more sentimental to me… I am in love with this wall hanging!!!

Below is a shot I took that doesn’t show my quilting really… as it hasn’t been washed yet.. but is just after I sewed down the binding to the front… then I slow stitch it to the back of the quilt… as I am doing above 🙂

And here is my “practice label” I wrote out on a sheet of paper to decide how big my triangle needed to be to include all the info I wanted /needed to put on it to properly label this beauty….

I bought the pinwheels and the embroidered pumpkin in 1 lot off someone on Facebook.. so I wanted her to have credit on the label.. thus the Pinwheels by info above 🙂

Now I have that label blind stitched into place along that loose diagonal edge… the idea for this style label can be found on Bonnie Hunter’s Quiltville blog site btw..

I am finally to the hanging sleeve …

I am following Bonnie Browning’s AQS video on Youtube for my hanging sleeve instructions… makes a perfect sleeve quick and easy… now to get it slow stitched down! That is my goal for today…

Once I get this hanging sleeve stitched into place I will wash and dry it so it crinkles ever so wonderfully and hang it for pictures and enjoyment for a couple days!!!!  Yipee for that!!!

I can then store it away rolled up for fall! 🙂  Now I am excited for Fall to come to Florida… even if not in cool weather with leaves turning all fun colors… I can enjoy this wall hanging in our foyer all season long!  And still go for long walks on the beach too!  Best of both worlds for sure!!!!

Linking this slow stitching progress to Kathy’s Slow Stitching Sunday post HERE!

I have also been doing some fast stitching…

I made my honey a very cool Valentine’s gift on Zena … my Singer 401a 🙂

I bought a yard of this cool fabric and first cut out the mitts per her instructions on Youtube…

I used 1 layer of Insulbrite and 1 layer of cotton batting per the Insulbrite directions… 

They are fit perfect… but we took a poll of our home and decided a bigger pair was in order… so I will make a second pair and gift these to my daughter for her future home… is this gonna be the beginning of a hope chest kind of thing?? lol!   I don’t know!  She is planning to move back to Tennessee when she graduates high school… she is on the downhill slide of her junior year currently.

Either way.. this pair will NOT go to waste! lol  We will use them until I buy more insulbrite 😀

My Review…

I really love her pattern… and Vanessa’s instructions on Youtube are wonderful as she walks you through the tricky spots… I contacted her via email when I read that my Insulbrite said to you in conjuction with a layer of cotton batting to be best… she said then use that in her reply … BUT this change put more bulk in that outer layer … so the fit is a bit more snug than it should be… but I do LOVE how well they work!!!  Thanks Vanessa the Crafty Gemini for a fun and easy project!!!!

Next up is….

A lot of quilt marking on this beautiful flimsy that has been PATIENTLY waiting it’s turn …

This is a partial sketch of my idea… I did this by importing a picture I took of just the center star and drew on it in PAINT… the more I use this method to decide quilting designs.. the more I like it and am getting used to what different functions do… how do you decide your quilt design???

You can see I have been pondering this project a while… This is over 10 days ago that I worked on this drawing… and I still haven’t sketched it ON the quilt itself yet!  Just haven’t had any time though it seems….

Ebay has been stellar… we have nothing that didn’t sell that we want to list again… so we are done with that for the moment and we have the $$$ to pay the house tax that is due… in Florida if you don’t pay your property tax on time… they will auction your house off!!!  It is crazy the hoops you have to jump through here when owning a home.. much different living in a high tourism state versus Tennessee where it isn’t that way… for instance here you have to show up in the tax office when you buy a home to prove you live here year round via evidence they ask for… mail etc… then they give you a homestead exemption on your tax amount owed.. .basically a discount because it is your primary residence.  It is also expensive to tag a car from another state in Florida… we paid a very high tax the year we moved here to get a Florida license plate and stay compliant to the laws.  

That said though..

 I would do it all again to live in my Shangri-La!!!!

Well… Off to slow stitch that hanging sleeve… but oh so happy I got to catch up with you!  Have a great week my bloggy friends!!!!